26/29 Season Three, Episode 11: Wrong Way Home–Scarecrow and Mrs King

Mrs Dennis returns to tell Amanda no one knows where Prescott/Pyror has gone..Mrs Dennis: Come on…Class beings in 10 minutes. They could be anywhere until then. Out here, another classroom, in the gym. I’ll start in the auditorium.[Umm wouldn’t you ask for a few more people to help look? after all it is a school security breech.. Umm but then I guess we couldn’t have the men swoop in and help huh..]Amanda: Thank you.
They go their separate ways searching for the boys..

Well Phillip and Jamie just happen to be all alone in the gym.. two brothers hanging out.. alone.. completely alone.. all their friends are outside and they are aaaallloooonnneee!
Did anyone notice how Phillip and Jamie are alone?

The boys are on the trampoline and Phillip is counting for Jamie: One, two, three…[whooo hooo!] Jamie gives a somersault a go.. but doesn’t quite make it.…No man, you messed up!Jamie: You try it. It’s not so easy.[wow.. flips.. no stunt kiddies.. I wanted to see Mancine do a boycine.. I don’ t think this would get past the union reps these days!]
We see the creep Prescott open the door and approach..

Philip: Yeah it is. All you need is bounce….(Phillip does his somersault on cue.) whooo hooo!
[well done PS! Bet he got kudos for that way back then!]… That’s all you need.Jamie: Good. Alright.Philip turns as he bounces and sees Prescott approach: There you go.Prescott: Hi.Jamie: Hi.Philip: Hello. Prescott: You are, er, Jamie and Philip. Philip: I’m Philip, he’s Jamie. Prescott: Hi Jamie. Hi Philip.What a total creep.. I guess the guy has been taking food from starving babies mouths for years..this is probably nothing..
Whooo the suspense builds!

We cut to Amanda outside on her phone..Amanda: I’m headed for the gym.Lee: We’re here.We see Lee pull up with a little squeal of the tyres.. That doesn’t look like a car Lee should be driving.. looks like a Billy car – I wonder what KC will make of it if she does anymore vehicle patrolling for us?!
Amanda enters the gym and stops short when she sees Prescott standing right next to the boys.Philip: Hey Mom, you want to start jumping?Prescott sees Amanda and grabs Jamie..Amanda: Fellas!Prescott: Don’t move Mrs King. Don’t move.
(Prescott pulls out his gun, Phillip randomly jumps off the trampoline- thus he’s blurry!)[gee almost like he knew he’d have to get off there for Lee’s action finale haaa]
(We see Lee has entered through the door behind Prescott, followed by Joe and notShamba. Lee turns and motions to them to stop) [rofl why does notshamba look like he’s having fun?!]Jamie or Phillip: Mom??Amanda I am guessing motions here to Lee.. but without letting Prescott realise that’s what she’s doing?Whoooo go Lee! who doesn’t swoon watching him here huh?!Lee quietly approaches Prescott,…and then suddenly runs and does a dive and roll [now that, Phillip and Jamie, is how a somersault should be done With a stuntman!!! whahahahaaha!!! ]
Lee and Prescott start to fight, Lee knocks away his gun..
Phillip and Jamie hide under the trampoline.
This is sooooo not Lee or Prescott!
Prescott punches Lee and sends him flying.. then he eyes off his gun on the mat.
Seeing Prescott is about to go for the gun, Joe runs for it, now is Joe’s chance to finally (grr) step up for his family!!LOL I think that is notShamba’s ‘I’m scared’ face!
Joe runs for the gun and manages to throw it further away just out of Prescott’s reach..
While Joe is busy.. notShamba runs to the boys and gets them out from under the trampoline.
Joe and Prescott have a fight.. my goodness.. Prescott err stunt Prescott really is the terminator! He just won’t stop.. a room full of people and he’s still fighting! LOL!
Well, Joe has a go at this tough guy stuff.. and in spite of what Amanda said earlier, he has a good go at knocking Prescott around haaaa.. Only he gets beat up by Prescott..(err stunt Prescott!)The boys run with notShamba to Amanda (and now Mrs Dennis- who doesn’t seem to be calling for help even though there is man with a gun in her gym.. Some principal! I should have words with Mrs Dennis – she doesn’t know Lee is an agent!)Amanda: Come here.The boys reach Amanda and snuggle into her arms.. awhh..

And for the moment.. I will pause here.. I can only take so much of these action finales.. so I’m not going to squeeze it all into one post.. and my goodness.. there is plenty going on here that we’ll continue with in the next post!

I wonder what BB would think of these action scenes now.. they were suppose to make Lee look like the tough guy here.. but 30 years later.. they umm.. don’t really! tee heee.. or do you see them differently? do tell!

I thought Lee was more tough guy hero when he told Foster: “Hello Mr Foster, I’m a Federal Agent, and what’s so ‘damned important’ is the amount of freedom you enjoy for the next 10 or 20 years.” whooo haaa!

Any thoughts you’d like to share? Does anyone remember watching this for the first time? were you shocked that the boys had been so close to danger? or lol.. that Joe actually stepped up to the plate and threw a few punches? 😉
byeee for now!

This gym scene does seem like a set up, and yet, I will try some mental gymnastics to make it work for my SMK brain. Maybe Philip and Jamie have become very excited about trampoline use and were eagerly awaiting the before school moments to work on some moves. Kids get like that when they are discovering something new and don’t have regular access to the equipment they are discovering. So the two brothers hightailed it into the gym to indulge their new found craze.

I agree that the action scene here is long and more complicated than necessary and I cringe at some of the stunts. But what I like about it is how each of the men respond. Something special comes out of a man when the ones he loves is threatened. The truth of the depth of their connection clicks into place even if they aren’t truly connected to it on a daily basis. Joe responds with action, and we all say, “Yay” because we finally see him responding as a father caring about the well being of his children. But it is the look on Lee’s face that hits me in the gut. I think it hits him in the gut too.

Quick comment about the school safety issue. I began teaching back in 1984. In California we were doing earthquake and fire drills and when I moved back to the Midwest it was tornado and fire drills. Just the other day we had to do a shelter in place drill and coming up we have to do a lockdown drill. So much has changed. Sometimes I feel like somewhere children got devalued and became targets. Schools used to be what we would now call wide open. Some playground equipment that used to be acceptable is now having to be removed because of supposed dangers.

At the time I watched this I was not bothered by them hanging out in the gym or the trampoline. Schools were considered safe and even havens back then. Now not so much. Doors that were once left open stay locked and we have intercoms, and security cameras, and visitor protocol and guidelines. At times the younger students become afraid because of all these drills. I know it’s for their own safety and protection, but I feel as if they are losing their innocence so quickly. Okay, sorry about that, I got off track.

For some reason I’m distracted by all the different colors at play here. Between Phillip, Jamie, the trampoline, the mat, the scoreboard, and that duffel bag there’s an awful lot of blue. Prescott and Lee are in gray and do I see a pink shirt on Joe to go with the pink sweater on Amanda? But Lee is wearing his jacket so much better than Joe is wearing his.

The former teacher (and current mom) in me is freaking out that the two boys were allowed to play on a trampoline unsupervised. Can we say neck/back injury/lawsuit waiting to happen. That school is pretty lax even for the 80s. I wonder if there is also a shooting range they kids could hang out in without any adults around to ruin their fun.

Interesting – I never thought of there being anything untoward in this scene in terms of a couple of kids having fun bouncing on a trampoline. We never had any adult supervision when we were kids whether we were playing at home or school, or the river or the park… or anywhere! We used our common sense and kept our wits about us. If you got hurt you patched yourself up or limped home or got carried home by your mates, where you invariably got a telling off for being careless enough to get injured. 😀 Not a lawyer in sight.
I think it’s changed a lot in the last 20 years with schools and parents now more hyper-vigilant. And I guess it’s a more dangerous world now in some ways. But is it possible people are too over-protective of kids now?

The rest of this scene is one of my least favourite in the whole series. Lee should have just knocked this guy out with one punch. What are all those Dr Pain lessons for?

I guess it’s more that it’s in a school setting that it bothers me because even when I was in grade school, the trampoline was never unsupervised and never two or more kids on at once (too many concussions, etc). I know the world has gotten super overprotective of kids and I am more of a ‘free range children’ mom myself, but even when I first saw this– i thought there was no way kids would be allowed to horse around like that. And even if they were, every single flippin’ kid in the school would be there pushing to get on . Really – a whole gym full of gymnastic equipment and Jamie and Philip are the only ones in there? Pu -LEASE!
A very clunky set-up so we can get the Spectacular Final Fight Scene. Spare me!

I agree with both Cindy and kiwismh – I let my kids jump on the trampoline and climb trees in our back garden with no supervision, while I get to do fun things in the house like cook and fold the laundry. Lucky me 😉
However, I’d like to think that at school, there would be supervision.

What strikes me more about this scene is why Jamie and Phillip would be playing together at school. They see each other at home – I’d think they’d want to play with kids from their respective school years. Phillip does, however, should the proper degree of disdain for his younger brother’s attempts at a somersault. And then shows off. This is what I’d expect from Phillip…

NotShamba’s facial expressions crack me up – although they do seem a bit inappropriate.

I have trouble worked out who is meant to be Lee and who is Prescott in the fight scenes as their stunt doubles don’t appear to resemble the real versions at all. I had to go back and check their outfits.

My experience in grade school was the same, Cindy. We had some freedoms that wouldn’t fly today, but from Grade 1 on I heard it every year — no one jumping on the tramp without people acting as guards on all 4 sides!!!

As for the question someone raised of why no stunt doubles for the boys, well if I were a kid and some asked me if I wanted to jump on a trampoline or have a stunt double do it instead, I know what I would have said!

yeah I didn’t think kids doing dangerous stuff at school was shocking Kiwismh.. not in those days..
The other thing we see here – is two child actors doing their own stunts. I was a little more surprised at that! 😉

The whole idea of two brothers getting to school and then playing together alone in the gym? that was weird to me! Most brothers I’ve met can’t wait to catch up with their school friends.. the brothers can play together at home 😉
Oh and lol.. there is a lawyer in sight here – Joe King!! (no seriously 😉 notjoeking!)

COMMENTING GUIDELINES

This blog is for the fun and indepth discussion of Scarecrow and Mrs King episodes.
Please be respectful of all opinions :)

***JWWM does not refer to future events in the show - it stays with the characters on their journey - explores where they are, and what has come before..
therefore- No spoilers beyond where the walk is up to please :) Thanks***

***All posts can be commented on at anytime- Posts are always open for people to add new insights to as they watch or rewatch ***

This Blog is rated PG - Just like the TV show! If it would appear in an smk episode, it can appear here! ;)

Any problems, issues or questions feel free to let me know. (iwsod@optusnet.com.au)
*By posting on this blog, you are agreeing to these guidelines*